REVIEW: Katie Cassidy gets in over her head in “Kill for Me”

Kill for Me is a rainy-day thriller. It’s not something you need to alter your life to seek out, but it sure beats getting out of your pajamas on a day when you really don’t have to.

Amanda Rowe (played by Katie Cassidy) is a college student who’s upset over her missing friend and housemate Natalie. She’s also got a creepy stalker ex who she’s pretty sure had something to do with Natalie’s disappearance. When her new housemate Hailey (Tracy Spiridakos) takes up residence, we have several minutes of fraught ladylonging (you know, college) and then fortunately the aftermath of an upsetting event gets them kissing.

The upsetting event also spins us into the capital-p Plot, so I guess we have quite a bit to thank it for.

Kill for Me is sure-handed about a lot of the elements that make up a good thriller: The pacing is nice, and I give it a solid B for tension. There are a few indie-movie flaws that are to be expected, such as that one time when the PROPS AND MAKEUP DEPARTMENTS WOULD LIKE TO SAY HELLO AND LOOK AT WHAT THEY DID, and the film’s bloody-minded refusal to admit that one should probably be able to hear a car pulling into the farmhouse’s driveway. But one can overlook them with a little moxie and goodwill.

The first couple of plot twists are good ones (and, hey, anything that leads to two fond roommates comforting each other in the shower can’t be all bad), but the end of the movie becomes a mess of trying too hard to be blow-your-mind clever and hatched plots that you can’t think too hard about without getting cranky over their impracticality.

That said, it’s a rainy day, and by then you will be deep into the cocoa, so who cares? Just enjoy it.

Katie Cassidy is more assured actress than Spiridakos, but they both do fine, and Donal Logue is an added treat. There is also solid direction and a few pretty cool shots thrown in.

Overall, it’s a better-than-expected way to curl up for an afternoon of scheming.